Courtesy of:- Ray Lo, and the Spurs List.

     FA Premier Reserve League – South
   Fulham Training Ground, Motspur Park 
   Wednesday 6th December 2006, 7.00pm

        FULHAM      v      SPURS  
     (White/Black)   (Light Blue/Navy Blue) 
         4-4-2             4-4-2

         1(0)               1(1)

  Ricardo Batista  1  Robert Burch
        TJ Moncur  2  Cian Hughton
   Elliot Omozusi  3  Reto Ziegler
       Adam Watts  4  Keiran McKenna(C)  
  Gabriel Zakuani  5  Phil Ifil
    Matty Collins  6  Leigh Mills
      Chris James  7  Stuart Lewis
      Wayne Brown  8  Jamie O’Hara
      Ismael Ehui  9  Tomas Pekhart
   Bjorn Runstrom 10  Andy Barcham
   Lino Goncalves 11  Charlie Daniels

      Bradley
      Hudson-Odoi 12  Joe Martin
                      (2) Mins
        Etheridge 13  David Button
         Anderson 14  Jake Livermore
       (4) 60Mins     (4) 46 Mins
    Matt Saunders 15  David Hutton
     (11) 46 Mins
                  16  Chris Casey
 
Scorers:-
     Brown 48       Barcham 36
                   
Booked:-
Omozusi 17          Pekhart  43 (late)
Goncalves 23(late)                
 
Referee:- S. Beck
Assistants:- S. Butler, I. Fissenden 

It was a cold night down in Malden for this match that was watched by around 200 people. Spurs lined up with Mills and Ifil in the centre with Hughton at right back and Ziegler at left back. McKenna and O’Hara were in central midfield with Lewis on the right and Daniels on the left. Barcham continued up front with Pekhart.

Spurs kicked off and soon took charge of the game with Pekhart’s deflected shot easily held by Batista after only two minutes. Zeigler and Daniels linked very well down the left side and McKenna and O’Hara worked hard in the centre with Jamie making several runs. So dominant were we that the ref had produced his yellow card twice in only 25 minutes to the home side. Barcham, Mills, Pekhart McKenna and Daniels all had chances before Barcham was set up by Daniels, and he slotted home past the advancing Batista. We failed to score more in a half that was very one sided and paid for it.

Both sides made a change at the start of the second half. Livermore replaced the injured captain in midfield with O’Hara taking the armband. It was a completely different home side that started the second half as they tore into Spurs from the off. James was the prime mover in most of the attacks which tended to go down our weak right side.

Ehui collected a through ball in the left channel and cut inside before hitting a shot across the goal which was going wide until Brown turned it in to the left hand corner. Spurs weathered the storm as they were pinned in their own half for over twenty minutes as the home side came close to taking the lead. They came closest when a header from Zakauni was cleared off the line by Hughton.

O’Hara collected a ball deep in his own half and carried it to the edge of the Fulham area before slipping Livermore in but his weak effort was held by the keeper. Barcham broke clear and dinked his shot over the advancing keeper only to see it cleared off the line. Clive Allen replaced Hughton with Martin who went into the middle allowing Ifil to move to the right back position. The game became end to end stuff as each side went looking for the winner.

Either side could and possibly should have won the game during their periods of domination. A combination of good defending and poor final balls kept the score down to a goal apiece. Spurs remain in second place in the table despite being the only team to remain unbeaten – we have also drawn the most games. Spurs' next game is at Stevenage when Chelsea are the visitors. That game is on Monday 11th December.

Ray

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